


Apprentice to Vlad

by BlackBirdAolen



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), Castlevania (TV), 悪魔城ドラキュラ | Castlevania Series
Genre: Alchemy, Apprenticeship, F/M, Natural Science, Potential Spoiler, Suspected Pregnancy, learning, mixing, playful banter, potion brewing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-30 18:51:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11469564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackBirdAolen/pseuds/BlackBirdAolen
Summary: Lisa is starting to settle in, and is eager to learn how to become a better doctor. Vlad is rather flattered by her attitude.(Possible spoiler-ish material, so, yeah. Spoiler warning.)Got a fanfic idea for me?My deviantART - full of original fiction.Snippets and ramblings on my tumblr.





	Apprentice to Vlad

After her arrival, Lisa made herself at home almost right away. The enormous castle of Vlad offered many wonders to observe. It wasn’t only the many machines that were moving the castle, but also the countless books, and Vlad’s ventures into science. She found the combination rather endearing. A man of supernatural nature, who was interested in exploring the world according to rational method and finding the cause of whatever seemed to go wrong with it.

Vlad had ceased his rather distant behavior only in so much as he allowed her to freely read any books she desired, as long as she didn’t pester him with too many questions. Lisa found his behavior peculiar, but she supposed that he had a reason for this. He had a reason for almost anything for sure, but it also made her wonder if she could change his mind about some happenings in the world. Understandably, he had rather little love for the church, which would have wasted no time to try and purge his castle from the face of this earth. But Lisa had just as little interest in them as he had. One little similarity that they established very soon.

Lisa wasn’t quite sure, however, how she was so different from other human beings. She supposed that she was the first to seek out Vlad like this, and more importantly, the first to be interested in the knowledge his castle offered, instead of seeking to do battle with him. She had heard of the great families of Wallachia, especially the Belmont family. It was their creed to destroy any supernatural creatures that would threaten mankind, and Vlad unfortunately fell exactly into their enemy scheme. But since Vlad had been secretive and quiet for such a long time, it seemed that the Belmont family either forgot about him, or had lost interest.

“Good evening.” Lisa always offered the same greeting when she stepped into the rooms of the castle that acted as laboratory and library in one. She had learned quite soon that, even though Vlad might not be present at all time, he still would be aware of her whereabouts in the castle quite acutely. The intimate bond between a lifeless construct and a living man fascinated Lisa, and she caught herself pondering in idle times what could have caused this special bond to form.

“Good evening to you as well.” Vlad stood in front of an arrangement of glass apparatuses, and was adjusting something for the liquids to mingle at a very precisely controlled rate. “You have been busy well into the morning hours again. Your thirst for knowledge is impressive, even though you should be quite aware that there will be many who will regard you as dangerous to their work. Especially if you can do what no one else can.”

Lisa chuckled, then approached Vlad from behind and touched his arm briefly. He allowed physical contact, but she rarely overexerted that privilege around him. She had only known him for a couple of days, and while their relationship already had bloomed rather quickly, she didn’t want to hasten things more than necessary. She wanted to have something of substance, not only a flimsy pretense of connection.

“What are you planning on showing me tonight?” Lisa observed the arrangement of the glass containers, and the connections between them. “More alchemical reactions that are hard to grasp for anyone but, apparently, me?”

“Quite a statement from a young apprentice.” Vlad’s taunt was delivered softly, and in a much more endearing fashion than it would have been towards anyone else. “But yes, it is another alchemical reaction which is rather simple, but would scare the average villager out of their mind, for no apparent reason. You remember the essences we drew from the herbs last night? Now, we need to mix them carefully, until they form a single concoction of very specific attributes.”

Lisa nodded quietly, and recalled what they had created the past night. They had gone through about two dozen different herbs, half of them freshly collected, half of them dried carefully over the course of three weeks. She named each of the drafts correctly before Vlad proceeded to show her how he had set up everything. There were three flasks standing by the side of the complicated arrangement of apparatuses, while five drafts were currently being mingled with a small amount of heat accompanying them.

“The important part is to not turn up the heat too much. A little too much temperature, and the concoction as such is ruined. Then you have to start the procedure all over again, and it will take another three weeks before you can come back to this point. It would be a terrible waste of time.”

Lisa nodded quietly. “The most important part is being thorough with preparations and precise with application. How did you put it? ‘We can’t just rely on a good wish and a prayer’, and that is exactly why I’m here. Wallachia sorely needs this knowledge.”

Vlad chuckled amusedly. After their first encounter, he had lost the cloak shrouding most of his form, and now often appeared in elegant, yet practical clothing. Though, having experienced his supernatural speed and movements, Lisa was quite sure that he would have been able to work in about any clothing without getting so much as a fine mist of substances on the fabric.

“Your ambitions to help are admirable. Yet I keep wondering how you can be so determined, when superstition overrides most human judgement these days.”

Lisa remained quiet about it. The words stung a little, especially because they were awfully true. She had promised to show Vlad how to live life to the fullest, and to travel like a man, but it seemed like such an odd thing to promise right now. In the light of the land being torn between old knowledge and new religion, it was difficult at times to remain calm and keep a cool head, instead of dashing forward and trying to shake people out of it.

Instead, she gestured towards the product of the mixing process. “I suppose this is not the last step in the chain of work? The three flasks are not there for no reason.”

“Well observed.” Vlad closed the delicate glass pipes feeding liquid into the flask, and removed the flask from its fixture. “Right now, the concoction is stable, but it has a very horrid smell and taste. In times of urgent need, it can be used like this, but it would probably lead to people believing you are trying to poison them. The taste, I’m told, is akin to the taste of swamp water, mixed with rotting fish. Which is why we are adding the three remaining substances. They not only eliminate the foul stench and taste, but also increase the potency of the concoction to some degree. The effect is not very pronounced, but it can make a difference nonetheless.”

Lisa, under Vlad’s guidance, added the remaining drafts to the mix, and gently swirled the liquids until they were fully mingled. She took a whiff of the finished product, and nodded slowly. The smell hitting her nose was astonishingly neutral, while before, it had left a feeling of fur growing on her tongue. She tasted it, and her face scrunched up lightly. “It does taste a little sour now. Like an unripe fruit.”

“A little bit of unpleasant aftermath cannot be avoided.” Vlad set down the flask and nodded faintly. “But it helps with persistent headaches and cramps in the lower abdomen. This should make life for the women of the village a lot more pleasant.”

Lisa couldn’t help laughing lightly. “You didn’t tell me in advance what this was turning out to be. But it is very useful, yes. Some women are barely able to move during that time, and in the eyes of their men, they are just complaining too much. Having a remedy at hand for that should not only help with the pain, but with the peace under the roofs of quite some families.”

 

***

 

It was months after her meeting with Vlad that Lisa felt that her body had changed. While before, she had been quite able to stay awake during the day, she now felt it difficult to keep her eyes open after sunrise. She went to sleep far earlier than she usually did, and that surprised her a little. At least, until she became aware of what had happened. Then, it was no mystery to her any longer.

“You seem a bit flustered today.” Vlad was quite amused, but also appeared worried. “Is everything alright?”

“Everything is quite alright, yes.” Lisa smiled at him. “Not to worry, I’m not feeling unwell. Though something is a little out of the ordinary.”

“Oh?” Vlad blinked in surprise, and then looked rather stunned when Lisa gently grasped his hand and laid it across her belly. “You don’t mean to say…”

“I’m not entirely sure yet, but my heart says that there is little doubt about what is happening. I will make a small test, to be absolutely sure, but it seems that our connection has reached an unexpected depth.”

A very, very faint smile appeared in Vlad’s face, but he still was rather surprised and caught off guard by Lisa’s revelation. Lisa didn’t blame him – she was just as surprised that it was even possible. It seemed that her influence had roused more than just positive emotions in Vlad’s heart. That their connection would even reach to such extents had taken her off guard, but Lisa supposed that they both had been surprised by what was possible between them.

“If this is really true… How much longer will it take, then?” Vlad had not moved his hand away from Lisa’s belly, his eyes still on her face. He looked thoughtful now, as if he already was trying to figure out what preparations he needed to meet. “Can you tell already?”

“I would estimate that it takes another seven months.” Lisa chuckled quietly. “Though, I have to admit that I’m not sure if it will not happen sooner. The mixture of natures in this one child will sure be something to behold.”

Vlad nodded, then guided Lisa towards a table with a couple of open books. She had asked him to teach her how to tell whether a person was really suffering from a curse (which was highly unlikely these days), or if they were seriously ill. He had taken extensive notes on signs that could be observed just from the behavior of the patient, and from how they held themselves during a more thorough physical exam. It wouldn’t involve any mixing of volatile substances or dissection of tissue samples today, which was just fine with Lisa. As long as she didn’t know for sure, she didn’t want to risk anything.

“I never would have imagined it to be so complex.” Lisa had leaned back in her chair and furrowed her eyebrows. “I always thought it was rather easy to tell magic from physical cause, but it seems that sometimes, it is one and the same.”

“Almost, yes.” Vlad thought about his observations several decades ago. “The difficult part is to get to talk alone with the patient, or with someone who is not scared out of their mind that you would worsen the curse. With the church pouring oil into a mostly harmless fire, it is hard to keep an open mind about everything. And that leads people to choose a simple, yet completely wrong explanation. Curses, for example. But curses are hard to weave, and nowadays, there aren’t many capable of creating them. And those who could won’t bother, because it is just too much effort for too little effect.”

Lisa held back a laugh. “I understand. It still seems like a weird idea to me that there are indeed curses out there. But I suppose that old stories often hold not only grains of truth.”

Vlad sneered crookedly. “There are many nuggets of wisdom hidden away, sometimes under so much nonsense that it is hard to hold back from slapping people across the face and yelling at them.”

“That would be a rather harsh way to treat them. You shouldn’t do that.” Lisa had playfully scolded him, and Vlad’s sneer only grew in width. “I know, except at times when they really deserve it for something utterly stupid they did. But that doesn’t happen often.”

“Oh, you have no idea, my dear. But now, shall we turn our attention back to the fine distinctions between curse and disease?”

Lisa chuckled. “We shall.”


End file.
